In a previous work I have endeavoured to show that in all probability there has been no stage in the social history of mankind where marriage has not existed, human marriage apparently being an inheritance from some ape-like progenitor.[1] I then defined marriage as a more or less durable connection between male and female, lasting beyond the mere act of propagation till after the birth of the offspring. This is marriage in the natural history sense of the term. As a social institution, on the other hand, it has a somewhat different meaning: it is a union regulated by custom or law.[2] Society lays down rules relating to the selection of partners, to the mode of contracting marriage, to its form, and to its duration. These rules are essentially expressions of moral feelings.
[1] Westermarck, History of Human Marriage, ch. iii. sqq.
[2] The best definition of marriage as a social institution which I have met with is the following one given by Dr. Friedrichs (‘Einzeluntersuchungen zur vergleichenden Rechtswissenschaft,’ in Zeitschr. f. vergl. Rechtswiss. x. 255):—“Eine von der Rechtsordnung anerkannte und privilegirte Vereinigung geschlechtsdifferenter Personen, entweder zur Führung eines gemeinsamen Hausstandes und zum Geschlechtsverkehr, oder zum ausschliesslichen Geschlechtsverkehr.”
There is, first, a circle of persons within which marriage is prohibited. It seems that the horror of incest is well-nigh universal in the human race, and that the few cases in which this feeling is said to be absent can only be regarded as abnormalities. But the degrees of kinship within which marriage is forbidden are by no means the same everywhere. It is most, and almost universally, abominated between parents and children. It is also held in general abhorrence between brothers and sisters who are children of the same mother as well as of the same father. Most of the exceptions to this rule refer to royal persons, for whom it is considered improper to contract marriage with individuals of less exalted birth; but among a few peoples incestuous unions are practised on a larger scale on account of extreme isolation or as a result of vitiated instincts.[3] It seems, however, that habitual marriages between brothers and sisters have been imputed to certain peoples without sufficient reason.[4] This is obviously true of the Veddahs of Ceylon, who have long been supposed to regard the marriage of a man with his younger sister as the proper marriage.[5] “Such incest,” says Mr. Nevill, “never was allowed, and never could be, while the Vaedda customs lingered. Incest is regarded as worse than murder. So positive is this feeling, that the Tamils have based a legend upon the instant murder of his sister by a Vaedda to whom she had made undue advances. The mistake arose from gross ignorance of Vaedda usages. The title of a cousin with whom marriage ought to be contracted, that is, mother’s brother’s daughter, or father’s sister’s daughter, is nagâ or nangî. This, in Sinhalese, is applied to a younger sister. Hence if you ask a Vaedda, ‘Do you marry your sisters?’ the Sinhalese interpreter is apt to say, ‘Do you marry your nagâ?’ The reply is (I have often tested it), ‘Yes—we always did formerly, but now it is not always observed.’ You say then, ‘What? marry your own-sister-nagâ?’ and the reply is an angry and insulted denial, the very question appearing a gross insult.” The same writer adds:—“In no case did a person marry one of the same family, even though the relationship was lost in remote antiquity. Such a marriage is incest. The penalty for incest was death.”[6]
[3] Westermarck, op. cit. ch. xiv. sq.
[4] This is apparently the case with various peoples mentioned by Sir J. G. Frazer (Pausanias’s Description of Greece, ii. 84 sq.) as being addicted to incestuous unions. Mr. Turner’s short statement (Samoa, p. 341) that among the New Caledonians no laws of consanguinity were observed in their marriages, and that even the nearest relatives united, radically differs from M. de Rochas’ description of the same people. “Les Néo-Calédoniens,” he says (Nouvelle Calédonie, p. 232), “ne se marient pas entre proches parents du côté paternel; mais du côté maternel, ils se marient à tous les degrés de cousinage.” Brothers and sisters, after they have reached years of maturity, are no longer permitted to entertain any social intercourse with each other; they are prohibited from keeping each other company even in the presence of a third person; and if they casually meet they must instantly go out of the way or, if that is impossible, the sister must throw herself on the ground with her face downwards. “Cet éloignement,” M. de Rochas adds (ibid. p. 239), “qui n’est certes l’effet ni du mépris ni de l’inimitié, me parait né d’une exagération déraisonnable d’un sentiment naturel, l’horreur de l’inceste.” Sir J. G. Frazer says that, according to Mr. Thomson, the marriage of brothers with sisters has been practised among the Masai; but a later and, as it seems, better informed authority tells us that “the Masai do not marry their near relations” and that “incest is unknown among them” (Hinde, The Last of the Masai, p. 76). Again, the statement that among the Obongos, a dwarf race in West Africa, sisters marry with brothers, is only based on information derived from another people, the Ashangos, who have a strong antipathy to them (Du Chaillu, Journey to Ashango-Land, p. 320). Liebich’s assertion (Die Zigeuner, p. 49) that the Gypsies allow a brother to marry his sister is certainly not true of the Gypsies of Finland, who greatly abhor incest (Thesleff, ‘Zigenarlif i Finland,’ in Nya Pressen, 1897, no. 331 B).
[5] Bailey, ‘Wild Tribes of the Veddahs of Ceylon,’ in Trans. Ethn. Soc. N.S. ii. 294 sq.
[6] Nevill, ‘Vaeddas of Ceylon,’ in Taprobanian, i. 178.
As a rule, the prohibited degrees are more numerous among peoples unaffected by modern civilisation than they are in more advanced communities, the prohibitions in a great many cases referring even to all the members of the tribe or clan; and the violation of these rules is regarded as a most heinous crime.[7]
[7] Westermarck, op. cit. p. 297 sqq.